"America has two great dominant strands of political thought - conservatism,
which, at its very best, draws lines that should not be crossed;
and progressivism, which, at its very best, breaks down barriers that
should never have been erected."
-- Bill Clinton, Dedication of the Clinton Presidential Library, November 2004

Monday, October 13, 2003

I got an email on Sunday from Kimmy Cash of PunxForDean.org, but I waited until today to post it because traffic slows down over the weekend. I want to give Kimmy a big plug, and I want to also give a big plug to the good folks at PunkVoter.com. Kimmy writes:

I can't begin to describe to you all the excitement that we, Punx for Dean.org, have for Dr. Dean. We are so sick of the way things are being handled by the current administration that we have decided to dedicate every second of our time skyrocketing Dean's campaign to unimaginable heights and showing an entire generation what a miserable failure the Bush Administration is. We know that it is in our hands now. We will most likely strike a new fear in the eyes of the ultra conservative. We will break in our second quarter with support that no campaign has ever counted on.
What most people don't know is that "Punks" have a real good idea about what goes on in the world and keep up with current affairs. You can't go to a Punk Show without hearing about lying politicians, citizen sheep, bible thumpers and corporate scum. We are very much aware and now we have the chance to really hurt their wallets and spoil the right-wing Republican agenda.
On any given night of the week in every U.S. City and State there are local and international bands showcasing their music to young Americans. Some with a serious message, others with no message at all. All have one thing in common: An audience full an angst ridden adults who have been pushed aside by this administration and forgotten during others'. We are the part of the disenfranchised that everyone speaks of. The more lies we hear from other campaigns and our current government, the more fuel we have to feed the fire. Sharing a common ground all across the Nation, it won't be difficult to spread the word about the good fight. The Howard Dean Campaign.
We will use the power of the internet, word of mouth and footwork of punks across the country. We will be showing up at gigs with a hand full of flyers and the blueprints to kick George W. Bush out of office! There is no competition, the Dems, Greens and Independants had us all along, they just never plugged in to us. There is no such thing as a RePUNKlican or a Punksevative. We are the disenfranchised. You have our vote Howard Dean and in 2003-2004 there's going to be a new Generation screaming for Dean!

Being a punk rock girl at heart, I can vouch for this. Punks are some of the most active, politically aware people you'll find, and like many in the Dean movement, they are disaffected voters who are usually ignored by the Washington politicians. Kimmy also sent out a call for action this weekend that I want to post here in case any of our California Dean Nationals can help out:

We, punxfordean.org, are putting together an all day punk rock show for Dean. Here's the deal.. we need video screens (similar to the one used at the Union Station party). We are putting together a Video to ignite our scene. Its going to be the Adicts "Viva la Revolution" song playing with clips of Dean at his most passionate moments.. "I want my Country Back" etc. This will have clips of Bush and his lies throughout. See, our scene is angry and anger and extreme passion is what will seal the deal with us. The show will have Dean Tables with info and we need people there registering us to vote. This will be held in the Inland Empire and we expect several hundred to show. Obviously we are in charge of getting the bands, getting the place and getting the audience...
What we need is a Dean Representative (can we have Dean???) to show our movement that Howard Dean and his camp truly do care about us, the disenfranchised punks of America. Let us not forget that there are approx. 5,000 signed up with Punxfordean.org The fact is that there were 40,000 people at the Last Inland Invasion Punk Rock Show here in the I.E. That's only here! You can imagine the number of punkers in the U.S. More than enough to start a DEAN Revolution I would say... Soooooo... anyone know where I can go for help? I had a guest column on the Gen Dean Blog and posted this there..so hopefully that works out too. We have alot we need to go over with the Dean Campaign and those involved. If you can be of any assistance, please let us know.

If you can help out with this show, you can reach Kimmy via her Deanlink page.

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About Nation-Building

Nation-Building was founded by Aziz Poonawalla in August 2002 under the name Dean Nation. Dean Nation was the very
first weblog devoted to a presidential candidate, Howard Dean, and became the vanguard of the Dean netroot phenomenon, raising
over $40,000 for the Dean campaign, pioneering the use of Meetup, and enjoying the attention of the campaign itself, with Joe Trippi
a regular reader (and sometime commentor). Howard Dean himself even left a comment once. Dean Nation was a group weblog effort and counts
among its alumni many of the progressive blogsphere's leading talent including Jerome Armstrong, Matthew Yglesias, and Ezra Klein. After
the election in 2004, the blog refocused onto the theme of "purple politics",
formally changing its name to Nation-Building in June 2006.
The primary focus of the blog is on articulating
purple-state policy at home and
pragmatic liberal interventionism abroad.